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NEW ESSAY from @Lindsey_Brink: The initial goals of the libertarianism were simple: lower taxes, less spending, fewer regulations. But the champions of free markets made deep-seated intellectual errors. As a result, libertarianism has reached a dead end. https://www.niskanencenter.org/the-dead-end-of-small-government/
The fundamental libertarian misconception is that “economic freedom” will come with a completely unregulated free market. “This core belief that the free market is somehow natural and apolitical is utterly and completely wrong,” writes Lindsey.
Not only this, but the libertarian thought to reject all tax-and-spend redistribution has created an unfair attitude toward social insurance and welfare.
Libertarian purists believe that private charity will suffice to take care of those who are truly unable to take care of themselves. This is manifestly untrue, if by ‘take care of themselves’ we mean something more than avoiding starvation. https://www.independent.org/publications/tir/article.asp?id=1369
The basic idea they have is that most of the poverty seen in America today is caused by the government: that getting help is somehow “addictive” and that “people are too dependent on government support.”
However, by relying so heavily on tax preferences, the American welfare system “is a bloated kludgeocracy that showers unneeded benefits on the well-off while all too often leaving people in need to sink or swim on their own.” https://www.nationalaffairs.com/publications/detail/kludgeocracy-in-america
This leaves us to see that the ultimate reason for the deformed structure of the American welfare system is the nation’s ethnic heterogeneity and long history of slavery and racial oppression. ( https://www.nber.org/papers/w8524.pdf)
“The disproportionate incidence of poverty among people of color leads to the perception that the welfare state exists to help ‘them’ at ‘our’ expense – never mind the actual facts of the matter.”
Libertarianism leaves something to be desired by those who have long been victimized by private/local coercion. Those that look to the federal government for vindication of their basic rights. It’s not hard to see why these groups are underrepresented in libertarian circles.
With an intellectual framing of free markets and limited government that appeals strongly to the rich, incumbent businesses, and those inclined to populist resentment, the priorities of actually existing small-government conservatism are unsurprising.
In a word, the cult of small government has become pro-business (that far too often only serves the interests of the powerful) rather than pro-market and opportunity.
Then the pandemic hit. In the face of government failures that have cost tens of thousands of lives and plunged the economy into crisis, the need for more EFFECTIVE government has become obvious. Libertarianism isn’t even asking the right questions. https://www.niskanencenter.org/what-the-pandemic-revealed/
Libertarianism today leaves much to be desired. And yet, its original values of free markets and limited government are far too important to abandon.
It’s time to rebuild those principles on a sound intellectual foundation: one that values effective government over anti-statism alone.
May be of interest to: @Noahpinion, @RachelBitecofer, @ThePlumLineGS, @RadioFreeTom, @Chrisvance123, @jerry_jtaylor, @willwilkinson, @gabeschoenfeld, @SykesCharlie, @henryfarrell, and others.
